Not Exactly a Watertight Deal

The U.S. Department of the Interior is patting itself on the back over a curious compromise: It will issue new 40-year irrigation water contracts in the San Joaquin Valley, and then conduct an environmental impact study to see what effect the action will have. That is about like holding the barn door open for the horse to escape and then studying the padlock to see if it met specifications.

Under the decision, the department’s Bureau of Reclamation would renew contracts with 28 irrigation districts to deliver 1.5 million acre-feet of water annually to San Joaquin Valley farms for the next 40 years. The department plans to do so even if subsequent study determines that diverting that much water from the San Joaquin River system carries an unacceptable environmental price.

Interior Secretary Manuel Lujan Jr. says that the contracts can always be altered, depending on the findings of the impact study. But two critical aspects could not be changed: the duration of the pacts and the total amount of water promised, which is about twice what Los Angeles uses each year.

Lujan did not want to do the study at all, so the very fact that it was ordered up represents a measure of concession. But by the time the study is completed three to five years from now, the water will already be committed. Lujan’s “compromise” thus mocks the law that requires federal agencies to study possible alternative courses of action before taking action.

As the Environmental Protection Agency argued, the contracts should be delayed until the study is complete. Water could be delivered to farms under temporary contracts. If the White House will not reconsider the decision, the state of California should think about joining environmentalists in pursuing a court challenge: Lujan’s action has the effect of arbitrarily abridging the primacy of state water rights.